This invention relates to a conveyor belt and a method of making same and, more particularly, but by no means exclusively, relates to a conveyor belt for conveying items of laundry.
One known conventional belt is shown in FIGS. 7a and b. Adjoining ends 1A and 1B of the belt Q extend perpendicularly to the intended direction of travel of the belt and are connected together by a plurality of generally U-shaped gripping elements 21, the free ends of which grip an adjoining end of the belt and have closed ends which protrude from the end of the belt. The protruding ends of the gripping elements of one adjoining end alternate with the protruding ends of gripping elements of the other adjoining end across the width of the belt and a hinge pin 41 is inserted through the protruding ends in order to connect the adjoining ends together.
Also, the ends of the belt are taped and hardened or bent over and sewn or glued to prevent them from fraying, depending upon the kind of material of the belt.
This known arrangement suffers from the drawback that when the adjoining ends of the belt pass over a roller L, particularly a small diameter roller such as a roller having a diameter of between 20 mm and 25 mm, the belt rises off the surface of the roller. This results in a loss of friction between the belt and the roller and this can result in the belt coming to a halt or slowing down.
Nevertheless it is particularly important to make use of a small diameter roller to make the closest approach possible to the narrow entrance of a heating chest of a sheet rolling machine in a laundry so that it can feed wet articles to the heating chest without fail.
Then, for example, in the case of a roller with a diameter of 20 mm, the circumference where the belt touches is 20×π×0.5 (the thickness of the belt)=31.4 mm. This can result in a loss of 25 mm of its frictional contact with roller L due to the belt rising off the surface of the roller.
FIG. 6 shows a multi-belt laundry conveyor and, when equipped with conventional belts, this has a problem conveying the work or washing evenly due to one or more of the belts coming to a halt or slowing down thus causing problems such as wrinkles in the work.
The present invention seeks to overcome this drawback.